DealBook: Dell Goes Private in $24 Billion Buyout, Largest Since 2007

9:22 p.m. | Updated For Dell, a $24.4 billion deal to take itself private is a bold move out of Wall Street’s harsh spotlight as it tries to remake itself in a world where personal computers are no longer the big business in technology.Yet the buyout — which was announced on Tuesday and would be the biggest by far since the days of the recession — is a huge gamble. It will saddle Dell with $15 billion...

Read More..

New Skirmishes Reported in Mali as France Vows to Exit

PARIS — Amid reports of continued skirmishes with Islamist extremists driven out of the main settlements of northern Mali, France renewed a promise on Wednesday that its soldiers would begin returning home within weeks, handing over to West African and Malian units charged with keeping the vast desert area under government control. But French officials acknowledged that, despite their claimed...

Read More..

DealBook: Dell Nears a Buyout Deal of More Than $23 Billion

Dell Inc. neared an agreement on Monday to sell itself to a group led by its founder and the investment firm Silver Lake for more than $23 billion, people briefed on the matter said, in what would be the biggest buyout since the financial crisis.If completed, a takeover would be the most ambitious attempt yet by Michael S. Dell to revive the company that bears his name. Such is the size of the potential...

Read More..

Well: Expressing the Inexpressible

When Kyle Potvin learned she had breast cancer at the age of 41, she tracked the details of her illness and treatment in a journal. But when it came to grappling with issues of mortality, fear and hope, she found that her best outlet was poetry.How I feared chemo, afraidIt would change me.It did.Something dissolved inside me.Tears began a slow drip;I cried at the news storyOf a lost boy found in the...

Read More..

Well: Expressing the Inexpressible

When Kyle Potvin learned she had breast cancer at the age of 41, she tracked the details of her illness and treatment in a journal. But when it came to grappling with issues of mortality, fear and hope, she found that her best outlet was poetry.How I feared chemo, afraidIt would change me.It did.Something dissolved inside me.Tears began a slow drip;I cried at the news storyOf a lost boy found in the...

Read More..

State of the Art: BlackBerry, Rebuilt, Lives to Fight Another Day

I’m sorry. I was wrong. This apology is for the bespectacled student at my talk in Cleveland, and the lady in the red dress in Florida, and anyone else who’s recently asked me about the future of the BlackBerry. I told all of them the same thing: that it’s doomed. That wasn’t an outrageous opinion. Once dominant, the BlackBerry has slipped to a single-digit percentage of the smartphone...

Read More..

Ahmadinejad’s Ally Arrested in as Fight With Family Grows

TEHRAN — Iranian judicial authorities arrested a protégé of President Mahmoud Ahmadinejad on Monday, the latest round in an escalating power struggle between Iran’s elected leader and the country’s most influential political family. The Tehran prosecutor’s Web site announced the arrest of Saeed Mortazavi late Monday night, although it gave no official reason for the action. The move...

Read More..

DealBook: New Details Suggest a Defense in SAC Case

At the center of the government’s insider trading case against a former portfolio manager at the hedge fund SAC Capital Advisors is a trade that directly involves Steven A. Cohen, the billionaire owner of the fund.New details about the case have emerged that could cast doubt on the way that trade has been portrayed by the authorities, suggesting a possible line of defense for the portfolio manager...

Read More..

Medicines Co. Licenses Rights to Cholesterol Drug

The drug, known as ALN-PCS, inhibits a protein in the body known as PCSK9. Such drugs might one day be used to treat millions of people who do not achieve sufficient cholesterol-lowering from commonly used statins, such as Lipitor. The Medicines Company will pay $25 million initially and as much as $180 million later if certain development and sales goals are met, under the deal expected to...

Read More..

Medicines Co. Licenses Rights to Cholesterol Drug

The drug, known as ALN-PCS, inhibits a protein in the body known as PCSK9. Such drugs might one day be used to treat millions of people who do not achieve sufficient cholesterol-lowering from commonly used statins, such as Lipitor. The Medicines Company will pay $25 million initially and as much as $180 million later if certain development and sales goals are met, under the deal expected to...

Read More..